The present invention relates generally to shipping containers and particularly to shipping containers that serve as display stands for articles shipped therein.
It is common for producers of small goods to ship their goods to retail stores in cardboard containers. Typically, the containers are made by their manufacturer and shipped in a flat stacked configuration to the producer of the small goods where the containers are assembled and are filled with the goods, closed about the goods and delivered to the retail store.
At the retail store, the containers typically are cut open and the goods shipped therein removed and placed into shelves for display and sale. Removal of the goods from the containers by the merchants is time consuming and wasteful since the shipping containers, being designed for shipping only, are usually discarded after being unpacked. In many instances, it is difficult to display advertisements or information about the goods which have been placed on conventional shelves without partially hiding merchandise displayed on other shelves. Further, if the retail merchant is required to remove the goods from the container, the producer of the goods loses control over the manner in which the goods are displayed at the point of sale of the goods. This can cause the sales of the goods to decrease if the goods are poorly displayed.
Previous attempts have been made to solve these problems through the use of shipping containers that also serve as display stands for merchandise shipped therein. Examples of such containers are illustrated in U.S. patents of Ross 3,692,174, Taub 3,918,576, Hostad 4,191,288, and Schroter 4,651,871. In general, these patents show containers in which the goods are shipped and stands for supporting the containers in an elevated position above the floor or other support surface. The Taub and Hostad patents also show display panels for attachment to containers and which display printed advertisements or other information concerning the goods in the container. The Schroter patent shows a stand that collapses and wraps around its container for shipment.
While the prior art containers are useful, they have not proven to be complete solutions to the problems discussed above. This is because most of them require some assembly of the container by the producers of the goods and later by a clerk at the retail store which can be intricate and frustrating. Further, assembly at the retail store by an inexperienced stock person can require as much time as removal of the goods from conventional shipping containers and placing the goods on the shelving of the retail store.
A further problem with the prior art is that the display panels for the containers which extend in an upright attitude from a side wall of the containers do not have adequate means of vertical support and tend to droop or are easily pulled over by customers who retrieve goods from the container.